Bruce Sutter was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame last month.  Jim Rice was not, which offends me both as a Red Sox fan and a well-educated student of the game.  Rice will almost surely make the Hall in 2008 or 2009 on a weak ballot, but it is a travesty that he is not in already.  My personal "votes" for this year were for Jim Rice, Goose Gossage, and Bert Blyleven who received 64.8, 64.6, and 53.3 percent of the vote, respectively, all short of the 75% required for election (Sutter got 76.9%).  I did not (narrowly) vote for Sutter.

I feel morally compelled to state the reasons why these three guys belong.  While you might not care so much, I suspect what I have to say will be interesting for anyone that likes to think about objective analysis vis a vis real world results grounded in hype, misinformation, and skewed data.

It is much ballyhooed that Rice was "the most feared hitter in the American League" in his prime.  This is true, but is not what I am going to lead with for my argument, and in fact, it need not even enter the equation.  Here are some facts that do matter: Only nine players in history have more home runs (382) and a  higher batting average (.298) than Jim Rice, and ALL of them — Ted Williams, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Stan Musial, Jimmie Foxx, Hank Aaron, Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, and Mel Ott — are in the Hall of Fame.  That alone should guarantee Rice’s induction.  But wait, there’s more.  Over period of 12 years, Rice was the American League cumulative leader in 12 different offensive categories, and considering both Leagues, he was first in 5 and second in 3 others.  He is the only player in Major League player in history with three straight seasons of 35 homers and 200 hits.  Of the 18 players who’ve been on the Hall of Fame ballot with at least 350 homers and an average of .290, all are in the Hall except for Rice and **** Allen (who with .292/.378/.534/351/1119 career numbers is shy of earning a Hall spot –though the SLG and OBP are quite impressive).  Rice’s career slugging percentage in the pre-juice/supplement and pre-expansion era was .502.  He was an 8-time All-Star and the 1978 AL MVP (though these are less compelling,  subjective metrics).  In short, Jim Rice was the American League’s dominant hitter from 1975-86.  That dominance, over a 12-year span, earns him a spot in the Hall of Fame.  There are no two ways about it.  Had he gotten just 18 more home runs and/or 49 RBI (to reach the 400-HR and 1500-RBI plateaus) by piling on another junk season or two, members of the BBWAA would surely have elected him by now.  It’s a travesty of this process that they have not already done so.

Turning attention to Goose Gossage and Bruce Sutter by comparison, I contend that Goose belongs in the Hall, but Sutter (narrowly) does not.  Their most relevant career stats (at least by percentages) are quite similar (significant in that they played in the same era) — 3.01 ERA, 1.232 WHIP, 1502 K (7.47 K/9IP), 124 wins, and 310 saves in 1809-1/3 innings for Gossage; 2.83 ERA, 1.140 WHIP, 861 K (7.43 K/9IP), 68 wins, and 300 saves in 1042-1/3 innings for Sutter.  Now, at first blush, one might argue that Sutter had a better ERA and WHIP than the Goose and that Sutter is therefore more deserving of a Hall spot.  Gossage, however pitched considerably longer, accumulating significantly more wins (56), K (641), and innings (767).  More importantly, not only did Gossage pitch longer, naturally accumulating more wins, K, and innings, but he did so EFFECTIVELY.  That is, Gossage had a longer career in which he was out there giving his team a chance to win a lot more than Sutter did in his career.  Not only that, when you compare the players "primes," those percentages that seemed to give Sutter a slight edge change significantly.  From 1975-85, Gossage had a 2.41 ERA, 1.126 WHIP, and 7.94 K/9IP, while from 1976-84, Sutter had a 2.53 ERA, 1.103 WHIP, and 7.61 K/9IP.  Notably, Gossage’s prime (11 years) was also longer than Sutter’s (9 years).  After 9 seasons, Sutter fell off a cliff statistically, whereas Gossage still had 4 more seasons with an ERA of 3.57 or better.  When you consider a player for the Hall of Fame, you need to consider whether he was dominant in his time and for how long — and this is particularly significant for relief pitchers — that dominance endured.  Each of these men was dominant in his prime years, but the Goose was more dominant for a longer period of time (and better over that span) than Sutter.  Not only that, cumulatively speaking, Gossage blows Sutter away.  It’s hard to enshrine a player in the Hall of Fame who has only had 9 productive seasons in the Majors.  The BBWAA did just that with Bruce Sutter.  You may debate whether that is the right decision (and I should note here that Sutter is credited also with the advent/mastery of the splitter), but it is unconscionable that Sutter went in, while Gossage was left out.

Joe Posnanski of the Kansas City Star also makes and incredibly compelling argument that if Sutter is Hall worthy, so is Dan Quisenberry http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/sports/13596348.htm).  Though I’d exclude both from the Hall, Posnanski’s article is an excellent demonstration of what I’ll call the "Freakonomics Principle," which states that people often reach irrational conclusions based on "conventional wisdom," hype, skewed analysis, and misinformation, while ignoring objective evidence. 

Finally, Bert Blyleven, too, belongs in the Hall.  His career numbers: 3.31 ERA, 1.198 WHIP, 3701 K (6.70 K/9IP), and 287 wins in 4970 innings.  For sake of comparison, let’s look at Steve Carlton who was a first ballot Hall of Famer: 3.22 ERA, 1.247 WHIP, 4136 K (7.13 K/9IP), and 329 wins in 5217-1/3 innings.  Carlton holds a slight edge in ERA but Blyleven’s differential ERA from that of his League competitors of -0.59 beats Carlton’s of -0.48.  Carlton’s K ratio is slightly better, but Blyleven’s WHIP (walks plus hits divided by innings pitched in case anyone doesn’t know) beats Carlton’s.  These three measures are good measures of a pitcher’s dominance, and by them Blyleven measures up to Carlton.  Now, there is the matter of Carlton’s 329 wins compared to Blyleven’s 287.  I hasten to note that wins are a circumstantial statistic:  While you certainly help your own cause on the front, the team behind you has as much to do with your success in this category as you do yourself.  Blyleven played for bad teams most years (though he did help the Twins to a World Series title in 1987 toward the end of his career) and won 20 games only once (and 19 one other year with 17 being his best several times otherwise).  Blyleven made only two All-Star teams and never won a Cy Young Award.  And he didn’t reach 300 wins.  But if Blyleven played on the teams Carlton did, he would almost surely have the magical 300 wins that would almost equally as surely gained him entry to the hallowed Hall of Fame.  And to pitch for 22 seasons (accumulating the 5th most strikeouts and 25th most wins in history in the process) at a level both objectively comparable to Steve Carlton (a first-ballot HoFer) and great for a career in its own right makes Blyleven a deserving candidate.